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Monday, September 24, 2012

Black-Eyed Pea and Cabbage Soup

Soup’s On! And My First Guest Post

Autumn has officially started for us northern hemisphere dwellers. And cooler weather makes many of us crave hearty soups. So this is soup week on Kitchen Riffs!

I’ll be presenting two new soups this week. Today’s is Black-Eyed Pea and Cabbage Soup. Later this week, we’ll do Leek and Potato Soup, a classic favorite. In today’s post I also provide a round-up of all the hearty soups I’ve written about, in case you missed them.

To see today’s soup, you’ll have to travel to Café Terra, where you’ll find the recipe in my first-ever guest post. Thanks to Terra for generously inviting me to do this. I had a lot of fun writing the post, and I hope you’ll enjoy reading it. Oh, you want the direct link? Read on.

Black-eyed peas and cabbage are the stars of this soup. Both combine well with ham, so we’re making this soup with a quick ham stock made from ham shanks (this takes less time than the traditional ham-bone method). But if that doesn’t appeal, you could easily skip that and instead substitute poultry, beef, or vegetable stock.

Although most beans and legumes cook faster and are tenderer when you soften them through soaking, that’s not necessary with black-eyed peas. They’ll cook in an hour and a half or so (if they’re very old they could take longer) – just enough time to simmer with the ham shanks and make a nice broth.

What, you’re still here? Get ye to Café Terra. Then come back and browse my soup hit parade, below.

White Bean and Potato Soup

Hearty Bean & Legume Soups

Mrs. Kitchen Riffs and I like soup — a lot. So we serve it often, frequently as a main course. And because we’re eating so much of it, I’ve posted a number of soup recipes.

I particularly like bean soups, and enjoy altering them to reflect the ingredients I happen to have on hand, as well as my mood on that particular day. Not surprisingly, there’s a family resemblance among some of them. For instance, the Black-Eyed Pea and Cabbage Soup that you can read about over at Café Terra actually evolved from three different soups I’ve posted about in the past: White Bean and Potato Soup, Black-Eyed Pea and Collard Green Soup, and Bean and Cabbage Soup. These are all quite different soups. But if you look at the recipes, you’ll see similar methods, and some ingredients can be used interchangeably. Another great bean soup is Tuscan Bean Soup, one of my favorites.

Of course, one of the downsides with bean soups is that they can take a bit of time to cook, so they require a bit of planning. If you’re pressed for time, lentils are the way to go. I’m particularly fond of my Easy Lentil Soup.

Split peas take longer to cook than lentils, but not as long as most beans. They’re best when cooked with a hambone, but you can also make them with ham shanks — just like Black-Eyed Pea and Cabbage Soup. For an example of how this works, see my Split Pea Soup with Greens (I’ve added some healthy greens to ramp up its nutritional value). If you want split pea soup, but don’t have time to make a quick stock with ham shanks, my Split Pea Soup with Bacon is just the ticket — you get all the flavor without all the wait. Besides, who can resist the great smoky taste of bacon?

By the way, all of these soups taste great when garnished with Homemade Croutons. Just sayin’.

Gazpacho

First-Course Soups

Looking for a soup that’s less hearty, but still delivers plenty of flavor? Consider my Curried Cauliflower Soup. It would go well as a starter for some of the Indian dishes I just posted about during my Indian Fortnight — like Tandoori Chicken.

Of course, now that we’re welcoming autumn in the North, our friends in the southern hemisphere are enjoying spring. One soup that tastes great in either season is Soupe au Pistou, with its delicious pesto garnish.

Here at Kitchen Riffs central, we’ve just about said goodbye to our homegrown tomatoes, and the weather is getting too chilly for cold soups. But my many readers in Australia and New Zealand are no doubt eagerly awaiting warmer weather. They have my Gazpacho to look forward to.

Meat Chili

Fall Is Chili Weather

One of the best dishes for nippy fall weather is half-soup, half-stew: chili. I offer a classic bowl of meat chili with beans in my Chili Basics post. This post also presents a nice primer on how to make most any kind of chili, including Vegetarian Chili. Or Sweet Potato Chili with Black Beans. That last one is killer good, BTW — and it’s vegan.

36 comments:

I am super excited to see all your other lovely soup recipes, Yum! I need to make your white bean soup. In Tucson, there was this small restaurant that had delicious white bean soup, my favorite:-) Gosh I love this time of the year, soup ROCKS! Thank you again for your wonderful guest post! Take care, Terra

Hi Terra, the white bean soup is good. Heck, all of these soups are good! My current favorite is the one I just posted over at your site. Thanks again for hosting my guest post (and of course for commenting here).

I'm always looking for new and hearty soups and you come up with ones I've never tried. I'm excited to try some of these especially now that temps are finally feeling like fall. This soup looks delicious! I've never tried a soup with black eyes peas so I'm looking forward to making this. Thanks for sharing the recipe.

I'm not quite ready for more soups, I must admit! I do love when soup season comes around though...they're such an easy meal to make! Thank you for sharing your gazpacho recipe...something I had hoped to cook this year and it will be a perfect Spring soup!!

Congrats on your first guest post! That's always exciting--I've always been intrigued by the possibilities of them but I guess that requires working up to :) I'm in soup mode myself--made some lovely tomato pepper basil soup yesterday--and I can't wait to give this a try. Thanks!

John...I am bookmarking all of your FABULOUS soup recipes. You know...I love to eat soup all year long. But I especially love to make big batches on Sunday to enjoy for lunch all week long! Your photos are gorgeous but I'm heading over to Cafe Terra now for a closer look! : )

Hi Raymund, we're flirting with chilly weather. We've had temps down to the mid-40s (F), although yesterday it got up into the mid-80s. But we're all in the chilly weather mindset, and that's what counts! Thanks for your comment.

Okay I'll admit I'm not a soup person but I think you've completely changed my outlook on it. I want to try this one and I am dying to try your chili. Off to check out your guest post. Congrats on your first one.